Before breakfast, Dr Johnson came up to my room, to forbid me to
mention that this was his birthday; but I told him I had done it
already; at which he was displeased; I suppose from wishing to have
nothing particular done on his account. Lady M'Leod and I got into a
warm dispute. She wanted to build a house upon a farm which she has
taken, about five miles from the castle, and to make gardens and other
ornaments there; all of which I approved of; but insisted that the
seat of the family should always be upon the rock of Dunvegan.
JOHNSON. 'Ay, in time we'll build all round this rock. You may make a
very good house at the farm; but it must not be such as to tempt the
Laird of M'Leod to go thither to reside. Most of the great families of
England have a secondary residence, which is called a jointure-house:
let the new house be of that kind.' The lady insisted that the rock
was very inconvenient; that there was no place near it where a good
garden could be made; that it must always be the rude place; that it
was a Herculean labour to make a dinner here. I was vexed to find the
alloy of modern refinement in a lady who had so much old family
spirit. 'Madam,' said I, 'if once you quit this rock, there is no
knowing where you may settle. You move five miles first, then to St
Andrews, as the late laird did; then to Edinburgh; and so on till you
end at Hampstead, or in France. No, no; keep to the rock: it is the
very jewel of the estate. It looks as if it had been let down from
heaven by the four corners, to be the residence of a chief. Have all
the comforts and conveniencies of life upon it, but never leave Rorie
More's cascade.' 'But,' said she, 'is it not enough if we keep it?
Must we never have more convenience than Rorie More had? He had his
beef brought to dinner in one basket, and his bread in another. Why
not as well be Rorie More all over, as live upon his rock? And should
not we tire, in looking perpetually on this rock? It is very well for
you, who have a fine place, and every thing easy, to talk thus, and
think of chaining honest folks to a rock. You would not live upon it
yourself.' 'Yes, madam,' said I, 'I would live upon it, were I Laird
of M'Leod, and should be unhappy if I were not upon it.' JOHNSON (with
a strong voice, and most determined manner). 'Madam, rather than quit
the old rock, Boswell would live in the pit; he would make his bed in
the dungeon.' I felt a degree of elation, at finding my resolute
feudal enthusiasm thus confirmed by such a sanction. The lady was
puzzled a little. She still returned to her pretty farm--rich ground,
fine garden. 'Madam,' said Dr Johnson, 'were they in Asia, I would not
leave the rock.' My opinion on this subject is still the same. An
ancient family residence ought to be a primary object; and though the
situation of Dunvegan be such that little can be done here in
gardening, or pleasure-ground, yet, in addition to the veneration
acquired by the lapse of time, it has many circumstances of natural
grandeur, suited to the seat of a Highland chief: it has the sea,
islands, rocks, hills, a noble cascade; and when the family is again
in opulence, something may be done by art.
Mr Donald M'Queen went away today, in order to preach at Bracadale
next day. We were so comfortably situated at Dunvegan, that Dr Johnson
could hardly be moved from it. I proposed to him that we should leave
it on Monday. 'No, sir,' said he, 'I will not go before Wednesday. I
will have some more of this good.' However, as the weather was at this
season so bad, and so very uncertain, and we had a great deal to do
yet, Mr M'Queen and I prevailed with him to agree to set out on
Monday, if the day should be good. Mr M'Queen though it was
inconvenient for him to be absent from his harvest, engaged to wait on
Monday at Ulinish for us. When he was going away, Dr Johnson said, 'I
shall ever retain a great regard for you'; then asked him if he had
the Rambler. Mr M'Queen said, 'No; but my brother has it' JOHNSON.
'Have you the Idler?' M'QUEEN. 'No, sir.' JOHNSON. 'Then I will order
one for you at Edinburgh, which you will keep in remembrance of me.'
Mr M'Queen was much pleased with this. He expressed to me, in the
strongest terms, his admiration of Dr Johnson's wonderful knowledge,
and every other quality for which he is distinguished. I asked Mr
M'Queen, if he was satisfied with being a minister in Sky. He said he
was; but he owned that his forefathers having been so long there, and
his having been born there, made a chief ingredient in forming his
contentment. I should have mentioned, that on our left hand, between
Portree and Dr Macleod's house, Mr M'Queen told me there had been a
college of the Knights Templars; that tradition said so; and that
there was a ruin remaining of their church, which had been burnt: but
I confess Dr Johnson has weakened my belief in remote tradition. In
the dispute about Anaitis, Mr M'Queen said, Asia Minor was peopled by
Scythians, and, as they were the ancestors of the Celts, the same
religion might be in Asia Minor and Sky. JOHNSON. 'Alas! sir, what can
a nation that has not letters tell of its original? I have always
difficulty to be patient when I hear authors gravely quoted, as giving
accounts of savage nations, which accounts they had from the savages
themselves. What can the M'Craas tell about themselves a thousand
years ago? There is no tracing the connection of ancient nations, but
by language; and therefore I am always sorry when any language is
lost, because languages are the pedigree of nations. If you find the
same language in distant countries, you may be sure that the
inhabitants of each have been the same people; that is to say, if you
find the languages a good deal the same; for a word here and there
being the same, will not do. Thus Butler, in his Hudibras, remembering
that Penguin, in the Straits of Magellan, signifies a bird with a
white head, and that the same word has, in Wales, the signification of
a white-headed wench (PEN head, and GUIN white), by way of ridicule,
concludes that the people of those Straits are Welch.'
A young gentleman of the name of M'Lean, nephew to the Laird of the
Isle of Muck, came this morning; and, just as we sat down to dinner,
came the Laird of the Isle of Muck himself, his lady, sister to
Talisker, two other ladies their relations, and a daughter of the late
M'Leod of Hamer, who wrote a treatise on the second sight, under the
designation of Theophilus Insulanus. It was somewhat droll to hear
this laird called by his title. Muck would have sounded ill; so he was
called Isle of Muck, which went off with great readiness. The name, as
now written, is unseemly, but is not so bad in the original Erse,
which is MOUACH, signifying the Sows' Island. Buchanan calls it Insula
Porcorum. It is so called from its form. Some call it Isle of MONK.
The laird insists that this is the proper name. It was formerly
church-land belonging to Icolmkill, and a hermit lived in it. It is
two miles long, and about three quarters of a mile broad. The laird
said, he had seven score of souls upon it. Last year he had eighty
persons inoculated, mostly children, but some of them eighteen years
of age. He agreed with the surgeon to come and do it, at half a crown
a head. It is very fertile in corn, of which they export some; and its
coasts abound in fish. A taylor comes there six times in a year. They
get a good blacksmith from the Isle of Egg.